To see what Tom and I look for in an editing laptop, please see this post.

There is a lot to like about those Dell laptops on offer. There are, though, a couple of compromises from what I consider a perfect editing laptop. The graphics card is the Nvidia GTX 960M, instead of the GTX 970M that we recommend (the top-of-the-line GTX 980M is too expensive to make it a good buy).

Secondly, there is no SSD, although there is a 8GB SSD cache. I am OK with using a 1TB HDD for storing videos, but I’d like an SSD for my operating system and applications – that makes the whole system work much faster. Not having used this laptop, it is difficult to say how much of a difference the 8GB SSD cache makes – it probably speeds up Windows… and that might be good enough. In any case, if I buy this Dell laptop, I will look to add an SSD (as a second drive) and move the operating system to it. Otherwise, these are great laptops and well worth their price.

Going back to the GTX 960M vs 970M GPUs, I do think that the 960M included in those Dell laptops is good enough. The truth is that even the most powerful laptops can struggle with 4K footage, so if you are working on a laptop, you should assume that there will be times when you will need to edit with proxies (i.e. lower resolution version of your footage). Now, if you are working with 1080P footage, you will be fine with the GTX 960M.

The bigger point is that cameras constantly improve and offer better image quality. That, in turn, puts greater demands on your editing computer. Rather than upgrade your editing machine as you get a better camera, it is more practical from a business perspective to use proxies – you will still need to upgrade your computer, but not as often.

Going back to the BH Photo deals, they end at midnight, so if you are in the market for a laptop, it will be worth your time to check what BH has on offer. You can see it here.